Boxing: Edwin Rodriguez didn't turn down $500K fight

If you follow boxing, especially the career of Worcester’s Edwin “La Bomba” Rodriguez, then you’ve seen the headlines plastered all over the Internet lately.

Like the one that screamed, “Edwin Rodriguez Turned Down 500K!”

Not true, according to Larry Army Jr., Rodriguez’s manager.

When the handlers of WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin (22-0, 21 knockouts) offered to fight Rodriguez for a hefty purse (reportedly approaching $500,000), Team Rodriguez agreed, according to Army. The next thing Army knew, he saw the story on various websites saying that “La Bomba” had turned it down.

What actually happened, according to Army, is that Golovkin’s people came back and reduced their offer “to a much smaller number” after the stories broke. One online scribe even said: “It looks like Rodriguez’s 0 is more important than money.”

The amount of the reduced offer is not known, but it apparently wasn’t enough for Rodriguez to risk putting his unbeaten record (22-0-0, 15 KOs) on the line, even though the fight was going to be at Rodriguez’s weight (168 pounds).

Golovkin, 30, is an ethnic Russian who was born in Kazakhstan but lives in Germany, if you can absorb all that. He never fought in the U.S. until his most recent title defense in Verona, N.Y., hence his low profile.

“Gennady will fight anyone from 154 to 168 pounds,” Sanchez said. “It’s like you said, right now it’s high risk, low reward to face Gennady, but I was told that Edwin Rodriguez turned down a $500,000 payday to face him. That’s a lot of money. Nobody wants to face this guy right now but that will change as Gennady gets more exposure here in the U.S.”

As it stands now, Golovin still is scheduled to appear in the main event of the HBO card on Sept. 19 at Madison Square Garden, but no opponent is listed. Rodriguez no longer plans to fight on that undercard, which had been his second choice.

Meanwhile, Rodriguez and Army leave tomorrow for Cancun, Mexico, site of the 50th annual WBC Convention. One objective, Army said, is to lobby for a higher ranking from the WBC, which recently dropped Rodriguez from No. 3 to No. 6 despite his impressive TKO of Jason Escalera in September.

That was no doubt Rodriguez’s penalty for surrendering his WBC-sanctioned USNBC national title, which he won in November 2010 by beating James “Buddy” McGirt Jr. Rodriguez stopped defending that belt after he won the USBA title in March against Donovan George.

“The goal,” Army said, “is hopefully we come out of there with some options of what’s next for Edwin, at least in terms of the WBC. I would expect that within the following 4-5 days after Cancun, we’ll have something in place.”

Army said there are two “high-value targets” on the radar screen, and that “both would involve very large purses and very large opportunities.” He stopped short of saying that either was a title fight, but he confirmed that one was an HBO telecast and the other was for more money.

Rodriguez, 27, has been working out recently with Carlos Garcia, his old coach at the Boys & Girls Club of Worcester, who introduced him to the sport back in 2001. Last week, the two-time national amateur champ sparred in Worcester with 6-foot-5 heavyweight prospect George Foreman III, son of the former heavyweight great.

Foreman (15-0, 14 KOs) is trained by “Iceman” John Scully, the former Hartford super middleweight/light heavyweight who also trained Worcester’s three-time world champion, Josť Antonio Rivera, late in his career.

After Rodriguez, who is ranked No. 3 by the IBF, returns from Cancun on Friday, he’ll settle in for the holidays with his family before heading to Houston right after New Year’s to begin working under trainer Ronnie Shields. By then, we should know his next opponent.

Garcia and Kendrick Ball of Camp Get Right have been chosen as coaches for the 16-person New England team that will compete in the upcoming USA Boxing regionals, probably in Lake Placid, N.Y.

“I was a little shocked they picked both coaches from Worcester,” Ball said. “It’s quite an honor.”

New England champions from Worcester include Jamaine Ortiz, 132 pounds; Bryan Daniels, 201 pounds; and Owen Minor, 201-plus pounds. If they win in New York, they’ll advance to the USA Boxing nationals in Tacoma, Wash.

Last year, the New England winners advanced directly to the nationals, but in an effort to save money, the New England and New York winners are meeting to choose one regional participant in each weight division.

Allie LaVigne of Sterling put up a good fight in losing to National Golden Gloves champion Liz Leddy of Portland, Maine, in the women’s 132-pound final last weekend.

“She let (Liddy) know she’s definitely right there on her level,” Ball said.

Ball’s son, Kendrick Ball Jr., will fight Robert Butler of John Ruiz’s Quiet Man Boxing Club in the USA Boxing New England 165-pound novice final on Saturday night in Lowell.

Five young fighters from Garcia’s stable at the Boys & Girls Club of Worcester began competition last night in the New England Silver Gloves in New Bedford.

The team is led by 13-year-old Nicholas Briggs (125 pounds), a past Junior Olympics and Silver Gloves champion. The other members are Omar Mercedes, 11, who is ranked second in the country at 60 pounds; Edwin Monell, 11, 75 pounds; and Juan Ruiz, 12, and Joel Maldonado, 15, who will meet in the first round of the 119-pound division.

Khiary Gray-Pitts of Camp Get Right, who suffered a dislocated shoulder while winning the 155-pound championship of the Rocky Marciano Tournament in Brockton three weeks ago, is back in the ring, according to Ball.

Gray-Pitts is “doing everything real light” right now as he prepares for the start of the Golden Gloves in January, Ball said. He returned to the ring just before Thanksgiving.

By the way, Worcester fighters now will compete in Holyoke rather than Lowell in the first round of the Golden Gloves. The reason, reportedly, is because too many Worcester fighters were taking Lowell’s spots for the next round.